Sean Hannity has been in Israel this week giving Fox News viewers all the pro-Israel perspective he can squeeze into a one-hour show. Frankly, much of it has been interesting. And as a Jew, myself, I can sympathize with what the Israelis are going through. But when nearly 400 children have been killed in Gaza, it seems heartless and out of touch to spend a segment lamenting how Israeli children are suffering by being forced to play indoors while completely ignoring the children suffering much worse in Gaza.

Hannity said in his introduction, “Now with the constant fear of Hamas rockets being fired into the border city of Sderot - well,l it has been deemed too dangerous for any children to play outdoors. “

Now, don’t get me wrong. I think it must be horribly stressful for the families and the children living in Sderot. But it sounded almost laughably clueless when Hannity's Israeli guest announced, “Anywhere else in the world, they take it for granted that (if) kids want to play, they go out and play. You cannot do that here. …Even when you do go outside, you never know when the next rocket is gonna come.”

What about the children in Gaza? Something tells me they’re not just going in the backyard and playing. Same thing with the children in Iraq and Syria.

Heck, there are kids in Chicago who can’t go out and play. Why hasn't Hannity visited them and done a feature on their lives?

So while Hannity makes a hammy showing of concern for the stresses of Israeli kids, I can’t help but think he’d forget them in a millisecond if they didn’t suit his political agenda.

Watch Hannity’s selective sympathy below.

UPDATE: For some reason, the video didn't embed. You can view it here.

I’m not defending the policy or even the people. Just noticing how the Israelis were more outwardly subdued in their support. Maybe that’s the difference between having the war in your backyard and going halfway around the world to wage it.

Anyway, except for the Netanyahu interview tonight (see my post in the AM), I thought it was a pretty interesting series for Fox and especially for Hannity. Too bad he has to come home and go back to the same old, same old.

Ellen— the people on the ground in Israel, many of them, are lovely people. But they support Netanyahu and the war on the Gazans overwhelmingly. Whether you massacre helpless civilians with genuine regret or massive callousness doesn’t matter much to the dead.

Israel is a complicated subject, but it is destroying its own soul.

Truman— I had to laugh at that stupid cap, too. He wears it inside, and after dark. I guess he thinks it makes him look truly “on the ground.” Dan Rather-style safari suits are so over.

Sad to say but I am not surprised to see this – Hannity is bummed because kids in Israel can’t play outside but, great humanitarian and Christian that he is (eye roll), he can’t be bothered to also consider the kids in Gaza. It’s the kind of coverage we’ve come to expect from FOX “news” with regards to the Israeli/Gaza conflict.

While I cannot stand to watch Hannity, I did see one of his reports from Israel that was inserted into Monday’s F&F. As you all know, FOX “news” loves its rotating chyrons – popping one after another onto the screen so that the right-wing talking points and agitprop can get out to the folks and set the tone for that day’s “news” coverage.

However, during this one particular Hannity report (which was 6 minutes long!), the usual frantic, rotating chyrons were not there. At the very beginning of his report from Israel there was a chyron that said, “Brief Ceasefire – Israel withdrawing most troops from Gaza” that remained on the screen for approx. 5 seconds.

But, other than that extremely brief opening chyron and the 3 times they quickly reminded us that it was Sean Hannity talking, a chyron remained on the screen during Hannity’s WHOLE report that said, “More than 60 Israelis Killed in War with Gaza”. I was waiting for a chyron to update us on the Palestinian deaths but it never came. FOX “news” was only interested in reporting the number of Israeli deaths. There’s no doubt that FOX’s very biased chyron was there to reinforce exactly where the viewers’ sympathies should lie.

Just curious…who decides what these chyrons say – the show’s producers, the show’s host(s) or does the particular guest giving the commentary have a say (which would be Hannity in this example)?

Anything Hannocchio does has a hidden political agenda. He is using this Israel trip to attack the Obama Administration and Democrats during the mid-term elections, and beyond.

Ask yourselves this question. Would he be in Israel if Mitt Romney was president? The answer is obvious-no. Hannocchio would not step one foot in Israel for fear it would make Mitt Romney and the Republicans look bad in front of the world.

Hannocchio’s reporting of this civil war between Israel and Hamas would be quiet different, if Romney was sitting in the Oval Office.

We don’t trust Hannocchio. Never did, never will. The fact that he’s using residents in Israel for his twisted and perverted political agenda is sadistic.

Listen very carefully to his personal digs on the Obama Administration and Democrats. He trashes America while in a foreign nation. If he hates America that much, he should stay in Israel.

Here’s a headline for the masses:

Fox “News” Host Trashes Americans On Foreign Soil

Hannocchio is the type of vile, evil cretin that would do anything to stick it to President Obama, and we mean anything. Even if it means using people along the way.

He’s not going to report on Gaza, and the deaths of innocent children killed in the conflict. Their deaths don’t matter to him. The same can be said in Chicago. Black children dying in the streets of America is not his concern. Those kids don’t look like his kids.

NOTE TO HANNITY

If a Republican was in the Oval Office, this little trip of yours would be non-existent, you crazy old man.

Jane S, I have actually found a lot of Hannity’s Israel interviews interesting, especially with the residents. I also thought the walk inside the tunnel was pretty interesting.

Not that I like what Israel has turned into but it’s always interesting to see what people on the ground say. What especially struck me is that the people were not the kind of rabid haters that you see on Fox. Except for maybe the indoor playground guy. And for whatever reason, Hannity seems restrained from his usual Obama bashing. So I guess he has to let his guests actually talk.

Thank you, Ellen. This particular Israeli meme makes me absolutely nuts. Hannity’s hardly the only one to voice it, but as far as I know, he’s the only one to devote an entire segment to the poor persecuted children with their indoor playground.

Israeli propaganda has been relentless these last few weeks, and it’s driving away people like me who are, or were, supporters. If you’re going to bomb the bejaysus out of helpless, trapped civilians (which you’ve walled into what is now the densest population on earth with no escape avenues) you really ought to come up with a better excuse than the horror of having to live with Hamas rockets … being harmlessly destroyed overhead by Iron Dome.

To call it “tone deaf” doesn’t even begin to say how awful this propaganda is. Israel has lost many, many friends in the U.S. and elsewhere by the combination of a brutal assault on the people of Gaza and the unbelievable, unbearable, awful propaganda.

On the up side, the walkabout in old Jerusalem with Dore Gold was fascinating as long as Gold was talking about the history and Hannity was reduced to interjecting faux knowledgeably “Right!” every half sentence.